Australia’s 482 Visa Changed on 1 July — and the Salary Figure Half the Internet Is Quoting Is Wrong

If you are chasing employer sponsorship in Australia, three separate things changed on the same day — 1 July 2026 — and together they moved both the bar and the price. The minimum salary went up. The application fee went up by roughly a quarter. And the queue you will actually stand in got longer, not shorter.

There is also a number problem. Search the 482 visa salary threshold 2026 and you will find two different figures presented with equal confidence. Only one is right, and getting it wrong is not a rounding error — it decides whether your employer’s nomination is approvable.

The direct answer

For nomination applications lodged on or after 1 July 2026, the Core Skills Income Threshold for Australia’s Skills in Demand (subclass 482) visa is AUD 79,423 per year, up from AUD 76,515. The Specialist Skills Income Threshold is AUD 146,576. Both figures exclude superannuation and are set by the date the nomination is lodged.

What actually changed on 1 July 2026

Most of it traces back to a single piece of law. The Home Affairs Legislation Amendment (2026 Measures No. 1) Regulations 2026 — instrument F2026L00874 — was registered on 30 June 2026 and commenced the next day, lifting visa application charges across nearly every category and codifying a new Temporary Skilled Migration Income Threshold of $79,423. Separate instruments moved the employer-sponsored income thresholds and a handful of related settings

The short version, from the applicant’s chair:

• Salary floor up. The Department of Home Affairs confirmed a 3.8% indexation increase, tied to the annual change in Average Weekly Ordinary Time Earnings, so that migrant wages track Australian wages and skilled migration cannot be used to undercut local workers.
• Fees up. Most visa application charges rose by around 25%, with sharper targeted rises in selected categories.
• Waits up. The Core Skills stream — the one most people use — is the slowest it has been since the visa launched. More on that below, because it is the part that will actually change your plans.
• Related settings up. The Fair Work High Income Threshold rose from $183,100 to $190,100, which matters because subclass 482 holders above a certain age can rely on it for a permanent residence age exemption.

None of this is retrospective. The new thresholds apply to new nomination applications only — they do not touch existing visa holders or nominations lodged before 1 July 2026.

$79,423 or $79,499? Settling the figure

This is the part no ranking page will tell you plainly, so here it is.

The overwhelming weight of evidence points to $79,423. Fragomen reports Home Affairs as confirming a Core Skills Income Threshold of AUD 79,423, a Specialist Skills Income Threshold of AUD 146,576, and a Temporary Skilled Migration Income Threshold of AUD 79,423 for the regional programs, subclass 494 and subclass 187. BDO’s migration team publishes the same CSIT figure of $79,423 across subclasses 482, 494 and 186. Milne Migration Solutions lists CSIT $79,423, SSIT $146,576 and TSMIT $79,423 for nominations lodged on or after 1 July 2026. Most decisively, the registered instrument itself codifies $79,423.

Yet a competing figure of $79,499 is circulating widely, including on migration-agent content stating that the Core Skills threshold rises from $76,515 to $79,499 and the Specialist threshold to $146,717 from 1 July 2026. Some pages attach a 3.8% indexation rate to it; others attach 3.9%. That internal inconsistency is itself a tell.

What to do about it: the $76 gap sounds trivial until you realise a nomination is assessed against the exact statutory figure. If your offered salary sits between the two numbers, you are gambling on which one the Department applies — and it will apply the one in the regulations. Ask your employer to clear $79,423 with genuine margin, and verify the live figure on the Department of Home Affairs website on the day of lodgement rather than trusting any secondary page, including this one.

CSIT, SSIT, TSMIT — which one is yours?

Three acronyms, one common confusion. They are different thresholds for different streams, not alternative names for the same thing.

Threshold	2026–27 figure	Applies to
CSIT (Core Skills)	AUD 79,423	Subclass 482 Core Skills stream nominations, and subclass 186
SSIT (Specialist Skills)	AUD 146,576	Subclass 482 Specialist Skills stream nominations
TSMIT	AUD 79,423	Regional programs — subclass 494 and subclass 187

Home Affairs confirmed each of these for nominations lodged on or after 1 July 2026. Both the CSIT and SSIT were introduced on 7 December 2024, when the Skills in Demand visa replaced the Temporary Skill Shortage visa, and both are indexed annually on 1 July under Regulation 5.42A using AWOTE data.

There is a third 482 stream as well. The Skills in Demand visa operates through Core Skills, Specialist Skills and Labour Agreement streams, with the Labour Agreement stream governed by whatever the individual sector agreement specifies rather than a published national threshold.

The threshold is only half the salary test

This trips up more applications than the threshold itself. Clearing $79,423 does not make a nomination approvable.

Employers must also pay at least the Annual Market Salary Rate if that figure is higher than the applicable threshold. In practice that means a role paid at exactly $79,423 in a city where comparable Australian workers earn $95,000 is a refusal risk, not a pass. Where guaranteed annual earnings sit below $250,000, employers also have to demonstrate that the sponsored worker’s remuneration is equivalent to what an Australian employee would receive doing the same job.

So the honest test is: whichever is higher — the threshold, or the market rate for that occupation in that location.

What a 482 really costs in 2026–27

The fee rise landed on the same date as the threshold rise, which is why household budgets for this route are suddenly 25% out of date.

From 1 July 2026 the subclass 482 primary applicant charge is $4,015, up from $3,210. A secondary applicant aged 18 or over also pays $4,015, and a child under 18 pays $1,005. The separate nomination fee of $330 and the Standard Business Sponsorship fee of $420 were not increased. The $3,210-to-$4,015 rise applies across all three 482 streams.

For context on the wider schedule: the subclass 186 Employer Nomination Scheme primary fee jumped from $4,910 to $6,140, and subclass 494 rose to $6,140 as well. The Temporary Graduate visa (subclass 485) went from $4,600 to $5,750 — its second increase inside a year — and the standard student visa (subclass 500) base charge reached $2,500.

Two rules worth internalising before you lodge anything:

1. The date received decides the price. The fee is fixed by the date Home Affairs receives your application, not the date you started preparing it.
2. It is gone either way. Charges are non-refundable even if the visa is refused — and a couple with one child now faces roughly $9,035 in 482 application charges alone, before skills assessments, English testing, agent fees and travel.

Eligible citizens of Pacific Island countries and Timor-Leste, and in some cases ASEAN member countries, are exempt from several of the new charges. South Asian applicants are not covered by those concessions.

The part almost nobody warns you about: the Core Skills queue

This is the single most important practical fact in this article, and it sits buried in employer-facing legal alerts rather than anywhere an applicant would look.

Processing times remain extended across key categories: the Specialist Skills stream is running at up to 57 days, the Core Skills stream at up to 10 months — and that stream’s times are continuing to increase — while permanent residence under the Employer Nomination Scheme is running at up to 14 months. Fragomen

Compare that with the original expectation. When the Core Skills pathway launched, processing was expected to take roughly 21 business days; by January 2026, 50% of Core Skills applications were taking four months and 90% were taking seven months. An earlier 2026 alert put the Core Skills stream at up to seven months and the 186 at up to 20 months — so the direction of travel has been volatile, and the recent movement in Core Skills is upward.

Why the split between streams? The Specialist Skills stream receives priority processing, while Core Skills applications are assessed in order of lodgement. High earners effectively skip the line; everyone else waits their turn behind a queue that is still growing.

And the visa application is not the whole timeline. The nomination stage often adds another four to eight months, and sponsorship approval can take up to five months for an employer that has never sponsored before. If your prospective employer is not already an approved sponsor, build that into your expectations from day one.

Sponsors are being advised to lodge early and submit fully complete documentation rather than adding to the backlog, and the biggest single controllable factor is whether the application is decision-ready at lodgement — missing health checks, an outstanding skills assessment or an unapproved nomination all add significant delay.

Which lodgement date locks in your threshold

A small technical point with real money attached. The applicable threshold figure is fixed by the nomination lodgement date, not the decision date.

Read together with the ten-month Core Skills wait, that has a useful implication: a nomination lodged in June 2026 is assessed against the old $76,515 figure even if the decision lands in 2027. Conversely, if your nomination goes in now, $79,423 is your number for the life of that nomination — a later indexation round does not reach back and raise it on you.

Is your occupation even eligible?

Everything above only matters if your role appears on the right list. The Core Skills Occupation List launched on 7 December 2024, replacing the old MLTSSL and STSOL with a single consolidated list of roughly 456 occupations identified as in demand by Jobs and Skills Australia. Those 456 occupations span trades, healthcare, engineering, construction and IT.

The Specialist Skills stream works differently — it has no occupation-list requirement at all, but demands the much higher AUD 146,576 salary and targets high-income professionals, executives and technical experts, excluding trades.

A revision has been in the pipeline. The expected 2026 CSOL update draws on a 2025 public consultation and the National Occupation Shortage List, which found shortages across about 29% of assessed roles, with health, education, construction and regional trades expected to be prioritised. Nothing is confirmed as replacing the current list yet, so confirm the live CSOL at the time of nomination rather than relying on an older copy, and check that your actual duties — not just your job title — match the ANZSCO code being nominated.

The route to permanent residence

For most people the 482 is a means, not an end. You can apply for permanent residence through the subclass 186 Temporary Residence Transition stream after holding the 482 for at least two years, but your employer still has to nominate you. The 482 itself has no age limit; the 186 PR application generally requires you to be under 45.

Stack the timelines honestly. Sponsorship approval, then nomination, then a Core Skills visa decision, then two qualifying years, then a 186 sitting at up to 14 months. This is a four-to-six-year project for most people, not a two-year one — and it depends on the same employer staying willing and solvent throughout.

If you are applying from Pakistan or South Asia

Nothing in the 482 framework is nationality-restricted, which makes it structurally more open than several routes covered elsewhere on this site. But three things deserve a clear-eyed look.

The salary floor is the real filter. AUD 79,423 is not a low bar for an employer taking a chance on an offshore hire with no Australian work history. If your realistic offer sits below it, this route is closed regardless of your skills — and that is worth knowing before you spend on a skills assessment.

You are behind an unhelpful queue. Core Skills is first-in-first-out, and offshore applicants have no way to buy priority short of qualifying for the Specialist Skills salary.

Cost comparison matters more now. For someone weighing Australia against Canada, the UK or the Gulf, a $4,015 charge before any other expense is a genuine barrier without employer support — which makes employer-funded roles considerably more attractive than self-funded applications. On pure speed and cost, government-to-government blue-collar routes remain a very different proposition.

Worth noting for completeness: the same 1 July package extended working holiday age limits from 30 to 35 for Cyprus, Finland, Germany and South Korea passport holders on the subclass 417 visa, and opened the 2026–27 permanent migration program at 185,000 places. The working holiday change does not reach South Asian passports.

Key Takeaways

• The number is AUD 79,423. CSIT and TSMIT both, for nominations lodged from 1 July 2026. SSIT is AUD 146,576. The widely-shared $79,499 does not match the registered instrument.
• The 482 fee is now $4,015 for the primary applicant, up from $3,210, with dependants aged 18+ charged the same amount.
• Core Skills is running at up to 10 months and still lengthening. Specialist Skills is around 57 days because it gets priority.
• Your threshold is locked by the nomination lodgement date, not the decision date.
• Clearing the threshold is not enough — the Annual Market Salary Rate applies if it is higher.
• PR via the 186 adds up to 14 months on top of two qualifying years.

Nothing here is migration advice, and figures change. Confirm every number against the Department of Home Affairs before you or your employer lodge anything.

FAQ

Is the 482 visa salary threshold 2026 figure $79,423 or $79,499?
$79,423. Home Affairs-confirmed reporting puts the Core Skills Income Threshold at AUD 79,423 for nominations lodged on or after 1 July 2026, and the registered regulations codify $79,423 for the TSMIT. The $79,499 figure appears on several agent sites but does not match the instrument.

Does the new threshold affect my existing 482 visa?
No. The increase applies to new nomination applications lodged on or after 1 July 2026 and does not apply to existing visa holders or to nominations lodged before that date.

How much does the 482 visa cost in 2026?
$4,015 for the primary applicant, $4,015 for a dependant aged 18 or over, and $1,005 for a child under 18, plus an unchanged $330 nomination fee and $420 Standard Business Sponsorship fee.